X the Unknown

A young solicitor, administering the will of a recently dead old lady, is drawn into a sinister web of events centring on her abandoned house.

Nothing is quite as scary as puberty in this exuberant feminist pre-teen body horror from first time Malaysian director Amanda Nell Eu.

Like Ghostwatch reimagined as a cheesy 1970s chat show, this deviously clever found-footage horror has scares to spare.

In Charlotte Colbert’s strikingly gothic film, an ageing actor recovering from a mastectomy taps into a mysterious power at a remote Scottish retreat.

Bringing a whole new meaning to the term ‘period film’, Andrew Cumming’s Palaeolithic horror movie is a true original.

Australian filmmaking brothers Danny and Michael Philippou’s feature film debut nods to their background as viral-video sensations.

Nicolas Roeg’s cult sci-fi stars David Bowie as an alien attempting to amass a fortune to save his home planet, but unable to escape his decadent earthly lifestyle.

Gareth Edwards reimagined the monster movie with his highly impressive DIY sci-fi, in which an indie romance blossoms amid the trailing tentacles of an alien invasion.

Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner star as the humans who make first contact with extra-terrestrial visitors in this richly textured sci-fi from director Denis Villeneuve.

Aliens wage war on a tower block after one of their number is bludgeoned by a street gang in this witty, action-packed feature debut by Joe Cornish.

Peter Cushing fires up the Tardis for the Doctor’s big-screen debut, as he and his companions travel to a devastated planet ruled by the Daleks.

In a far flung future, the monstrous metallic Daleks are inhuman alien overlords of Earth. Can interplanetary time traveller Dr Who thwart them?

Roy Ward Baker directs John Mills and Joan Greenwood in this mystery noir about an amnesiac implicated in the murder of a young woman.

Austerity noir: Ealing's downbeat but compelling East End thriller.

Deeply moving mining drama that provided the legendary American singer/actor Paul Robeson with his best British film role.

Alastair Sim is in splendid form as a staid, slightly seedy solicitor in this cheerfully patriotic war-time espionage comedy.

H.G. Wells' chilling vision of the future, which imagines the 20th Century as a near-endless war and struggle against tyranny, remains a key milestone in British science fiction.

An extraordinary story of survival in the wastes of Antarctica.

A desperate delivery driver gets caught up in the dark underworld of Riyadh in Ali Kalthami’s gripping, pitch-black satire.

John Pilger's film on the conflict in Northern Ireland is a skilful mix of investigative journalism, documentary storytelling and reflections on contemporary history.

John Pilger's portrayal of the oldest continuous human culture is also an investigation into a suppressed colonial past, and rapacious present.

John Pilger’s prescient 60th film for ITV is both a warning and an inspiring story of resistance.  

Teenage romance simmers in a strict Himalayan boarding school in this sublime coming-of-age tale. Winner of the 2024 Sundance audience prize.